The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the long-known inadequacies and restrictions in South Africa’s copyright law that negatively affect access to information, knowledge-sharing, and the provision of relevant teaching and research materials in our educational institutions. The law is 42 years old and totally outdated. It does have fair dealing and some limited provisions for education, libraries and archives but there are no exceptions for people with disabilities, and the law does not address the digital environment at all.
This situation meant that access to hardcopy material, multi-media and archival collections in libraries and archives was totally closed off. Overnight, e-learning platforms became the virtual classroom for schools and tertiary institutions. Suddenly institutions had to find funding to assist students with software, hardware, training, and mobile data costs to enable them to access their study material.
One lecturer, who was unable to access the hard-copy book in the institution’s library, asked the publisher for permission to place sections of the e-book version on her institution’s password-protected e-learning platform. It would have given access to registered students for that course only, for a period of 6 weeks. The request was declined on the basis that the copying was not permitted under the licence. So she wrote to the collective management organization (CMO) asking for assistance. But the CMO said they could not assist if permission had already been declined by the publisher! Other lecturers also hit the permissions wall when publishers and CMOs also declined requests due to licence restrictions. Instead students were told to buy the e-books, even though they had already purchased the print version and just couldn’t access it during the lockdown. Obviously it was impossible for students to purchase the book again.
The Copyright Amendment Bill provisions would have been extremely helpful to all stakeholders in the COVID-19 lockdown, but especially to the library and educational sectors, and for people with disabilities. For example, the Bill would have supported the making of digital copies by libraries, and the use of audio-visual material for online learning. Fair use would have provided the legal flexibility needed by teachers, students and libraries seeking to maintain education and homeschooling during lockdown. And the provisions could not be taken away by licence terms.
It is crucial that Parliament addresses the constitutional concerns raised by the President expeditiously, astutely and transparently so that the Bill can finally be enacted for the benefit of all South Africans.
Full text: https://www.eifl.net/blogs/how-sas-copyright-bill-would-benefit-citizens-during-covid
Denise R. Nicholson, Scholarly Communications Librarian, University of the Witwatersrand